Tag Archives: Mistakes were made

#0106: Black Hand

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Reviews and tagged with , , , , ,

BLACK HAND

GREEN LANTERN: REBIRTH (DC DIRECT)

I’ve mentioned before that I’m quite the Green Lantern fan.  Well, I’ll be frank, that doesn’t really extend to his villains.  Sure, I’m a fan of characters like Sinestro and the original Star Sapphire, and heck I’m even a pretty decent fan of characters like Sonar, Evil Star and Goldface.  But there are some Green Lantern villains I just plain don’t like.  Like, for instance, Hector Hammond, star villain of the 2011 Green Lantern movie.  My opinion of today’s character, Black Hand, is not as simple as the previously mentioned opinions.  No, he’s much more complex, and today’s figure just plays right into those mixed feelings.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Black Hand was released as part of the first wave of DC Direct’s Green Lantern: Rebirth line, done to coincide with the comic event of the same name.  Hand himself only has a minor appearance in the actual Rebirth series, and he doesn’t look like this.  The figure here is actually based on Hand’s look in the re-launch GL book shortly after Rebirth.  While this is the look that would gain notoriety in Blackest Night and the like, it’s presence here seems to be solely because it was what Hand was wearing at the time, as the character would remain relatively obscure for a few more years.  Anyway, the figure stands a little over 6 inches tall, and features 11 points of articulation.  He looks to be built on a similar under-lying structure to that of the Hal Jordan figure released in this line.  The outer details are different, with Black Hand featuring a lot more details on his costume.  In particular, he’s got lots of wrinkles all over his costume.  What, does this guy not have an iron?  On his left arm, he’s got straps and buckles, I guess to “modernize” the character’s look.  The Right hand is the titular “black hand”, and is exposed in all its veiny goodness.  This guy also has a lot of rivets, which begs the question:  is his cosume actually riveted on to him?  That might explain the figure’s surly facial expression.  Black Hand is topped off by a non-removable rubber cape.  It’s a decent sculpt, but it can make the figure a bit top heavy.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

So, I’ve done my (mostly) non-biased review of the figure itself.  Now, onto the nitty-gritty, me part:  I absolutely, without a doubt in my mind, hate the modern Black Hand, and pretty much everything he’s been involved with.  I know, that’s a strong opinion, but I just haven’t liked what he’s been involved with.  Classic Black Hand had a pretty neat design, and while he was hokey as hell, that was a lot of fun.  A decent character.  But, hokey characters can’t be hokey anymore, so we wound up with this redo of the character, where he’s got leather straps, and wrinkles, a random lines all over the place, and looks like a zombie.  And, hey, “Black Hand” makes no sense, unless you spell it out for people by giving him a BLACK HAND!  Hey, MGM, I’ve got an idea for a Goldfinger remake.  Here’s the twist:  Goldfinger loses one of his fingers, and he has to replace it with one MADE OF GOLD!

I know what you’re thinking: If you hate the design so much, why do you have the figure?  Because I got him for a dollar.  And for a dollar I guess he’s alright.

#0091: Hal Jordan

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Reviews and tagged with , , , ,

HAL JORDAN

GREEN LANTERN (MOVIE)

Having rounded up all of my Christmas gift reviews (barring any late gifts, I suppose), I’ll be moving back to my regularly scheduled programming of random figures from my vast collection.  A large subset of my collection is solely Green Lantern items, due to me being a really big fan of the character.  Being such a fan, sometimes I buy stuff solely because it’s Green Lantern.  That was the case with today’s figure, which hails from Mattel’s toy line to tie in with 2011’s Green Lantern movie.  It’s the basic version of the main character, Hal Jordan.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Hal was released in the first wave of figures from Mattel’s Green Lantern line, which came out a few short weeks before the movie’s release.    He stands about 4 inches tall and has 8 points of articulation.    He’s based on Hal’s fully GL’ed up look from the movie.  The sculpt is passable, though the details are a bit on the soft side. The likeness on the head is pretty good, with a decent representation of Ryan Reynolds from the movie.  The paint is fine, nothing spectacular, but there’s no slop of smudges which is nice, but details like Green Lantern’s power ring are left completely unpainted.  This gives the figure a cheap look, but it’s wasn’t a “cheap” figure to buy.  Hal includes a clear green construct.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

Yeah, so this figure is, well he’s not very good.  If he’d been released 10 years earlier, perhaps it’d be okay, but not for a modern day figure.  It’s cheaply made, the paint is as simplistic as possible, and he has practically no articulation, which means he’s not a very entertaining figure.  I have this figure because and only because it’s a Green Lantern action figure.

#0077: Batzarro

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Reviews and tagged with , , , , ,

BATZARRO

DC UNIVERSE CLASSICS

Happy New Year everyone!

This isn’t the first time I’ve looked at DC Universe Classics, and I’ve gone into my frustrations with the line and those running it.  The final figure in the second and final year of the subscription’s run was just released this month, and he fits in perfectly with the overall mixed feelings of the line.  Anyway, I’ll save my thoughts for the last section. In the meantime, I’ll take a look at Batzarro.

Real quick sum up of the character for those who aren’t familiar:  In the 60s, the character Bizzarro was created as an Anti-Superman.  He spoke in backwards sentences, used reverse logic, and had the opposite powers of the Superman.  40 some years later, writer Jeff Loeb and artist Ed McGuinness created Batzarro, the Batman to Bizzarro’s Superman.  His name is Wayne Bruce, and he turned to a life of crime when his parents were born in crime alley.  Yes, that’s really his origin.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Batzarro was the 12th figure in Mattel’s 2013 DC Universe Classics: Signature Series subscription.  He stands a little over 6 inches tall, and has 23 points of articulation.  Batzarro has had exactly one look… ever.  So, that’s the look depicted here, which is far from shocking.  Batzarro is made from a fair deal of reused pieces, with a new head, cape and belt.  The rest of the figure is built on a basic DCUC body, specifically the Batman body.  It’s a sensible reuse, given the nature of the character, so no issues there.  The new pieces are all very well done.  In particular, the head looks spot on to the character, with his eyeless cowl and evil grin.  The paint on the figure isn’t perfect, as I did notice a few fuzzy lines and some missed marks, particularly on his belt buckle, which is a noticeable distance from the edge.  But it’s also far from terrible, so, it doesn’t ruin the figure.  It’s just mildly annoying.  Batzarro includes a single accessory, his batarang.  Given his place as the anti-Batman, Batzarro was frequently depicted toting around dual pistols, and the lack of inclusion here is unfortunate, especially given the pricepoint of the figure.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

So, yeah… this figure.  Hands down, one of the most mixed-feelings-y figures of all time.  You see, I didn’t want to like this figure.  At only 12 figures a year, he’s an absolutely terrible choice.  The character had one storyline, a few years ago.  It wasn’t a monumental story, and he’s not even really a major player in it.  The character’s design is perfectly fine, but not revolutionary.  Of all the characters in the DC Universe, he’s far from the top of anyone’s list of “necessary characters.”  And his placement at the end of the year means two things. 1) He wasn’t amongst the characters subscribers were shown when they signed up, meaning we had to accept him whether we liked it or not, and 2) he was one of the figures that had a direct impact on if the next year of the line went through or not.  Unsurprisingly, next year’s subscription didn’t go through.

But quite frankly, the most damning thing about this figure is that he’s actually a pretty well done figure.  Not the best in the line, but actually good.  Better than a lot of the other figures offered this year.  So, this figure that nobody wanted ended up much better than several of the figures that people have been wanting for years.  It all just leaves a bad taste in the mouth and further punctuates the mismanagement of the line.  So, here I am with a figure I quite like of a character I’m just indifferent about.  I suppose that’s not all bad…

#0043: Princess Leia

Posted by Ethan Wilson in Reviews and tagged with , , , ,

PRINCESS LEIA – SLAVE OUTFIT

STAR WARS: THE BLACK SERIES

Happy Thanksgiving to my American readers!  Today, I’ll be doing my first review from what is quickly becoming my favorite toy line on the market:  Star Wars: The Black Series.  I’m going to assume that everyone reading knows what Star Wars is.  However, here’s a little backstory on “The Black Series.”   For 35 years, Star Wars toys have been made in the very successful 3 ¾ inch scale.  I don’t mind the scale, and Star Wars made it a standard for quite a while.  However, the figures being as small as they are leads to limitations on the level of detail and articulation each figure gets.  Since the introduction of lines like DC Universe Classics and Marvel Legends, which helped popularize the 6-inch scale, Star Wars fans have been requesting a similar line for the Star Wars characters.  And this year, Hasbro obliged with Star Wars: The Black Series.  The figures are 6 inch scale, feature lots of articulation, and generally feature better paint and a few extra accessories.  I just got the second series of the line, so I’ll be taking a look at those in the next couple of days.  I’ll start with Princess Leia.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Like I mentioned above, Leia is from the second series of Star Wars: The Black Series.  Hasbro’s decided to give each figure a number, and Leia is #005.  Leia is based on her look from early in Return of the Jedi, when she’s is taken captive by Jabba the Hutt.  It’s not her most definitive look, but I suppose it has a fairly sizeable fan base, for what would seem to be obvious reasons.  The figure stands a little over 5 inches tall and features 18 points of articulation.  At first glance she seems a bit too small, especially next to the other figures in the line, but Carrie Fisher’s listed height is 5’1”(a full FOOT shorter than costar Harrison Ford), so she’s in proper scale for a 1:12 scale figure.   Leia’s a totally new sculpt, and it’s fairly good, apart from one glaring issue:  The articulation.  The joints on the figure are incredibly obvious.  Now, I’m not saying that I dislike visible articulation, but I don’t like when it gets to glaring, because that hurts the aesthetic of the figure.  Anyway, aside from the articulation issue, the sculpt is well done.  The likeness on the head is really good, and may very well be the best likeness in the line so far.  Unfortunately, the sculpt is hidden under some pretty sloppy paint.  Mine isn’t as bad as some others I’ve seen, but the paint has a tendency to be places it shouldn’t on the head.  The rest of the body is painted perfectly fine, and they even matched the painted flesh tone on the head with the molded flesh tone on the body, which can be tricky.  In addition to sculpted pieces, Leia features a cloth skirt.  I don’t hate it in theory, but I’m not a fan in practice.  It’s a piece of cheap, un-hemmed fabric, so it’s going to fray like crazy.  In fact, it was already fraying in the package.  I really wish they’d gone with something with a bit more durability.  Leia is rounded out with an axe thing, and a pole thing (technical terms!) that she uses in the film.  They’re sculpted well, and fit into Leia’s hands with ease.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

I like this figure, but I have my issues with it.  Chief among them is the fact that the fact that the first version of Princess Leia, a central character, released in this line is a fairly non-essential version of her.  Coupled with the fact that it’s probably the one look of hers that really doesn’t translate well to figure form, the figure’s a bit of a mixed bag.  I really hope that this one was just a practice round for one of her more definitive looks.